Page 11 of Silent Truths

I felt like absolute shit. There was no other word for it. My head was pounding. My mouth tasted fucking horrible and was so dry, I felt like I was choking when I swallowed. My limbs were too heavy for me to really function. And everything was too goddamn loud. Why was the fucking air conditioning so noisy? Was it broken?

“Someone needs to fix the AC,” I mumbled.

The bed shifted beside me, and a familiar body pressed against my back. An arm draped over my side so they could lean over me and look down at my face. I blinked at Salem, surprised to find him… cuddling me. His dark hair was a mess—messier than usual—which meant he’d just woken up. His dark eyes were coated in sleep.

“Why are you in my bed?” I mumbled, closing my eyes again when staring at him just made me dizzy and nauseous. I didn’t even have the energy to push him away from me. Besides… I was feeling shitty enough that I wanted him close just for a moment, even with all the animosity between us.

“I was worried you might overdose or choke on your own vomit,” Salem told me conversationally. I grunted. “You wouldn’t tell me what you took other than pills.”

“Oxys,” I muttered. “I think.”

Salem sighed, clear disapproval in that single noise, but I didn’t have the energy to fight with him. For once, I felt as dead on the outside as I did on the inside. And I was pretty sure I might throw up in the next five minutes.

“You smell like you bathed in alcohol,” Salem finally said. “You need a shower.”

“Can’t move,” I mumbled, my eyes still shut.

Salem sighed again, and then his body heat was gone, making me shiver. The sick, nauseous feeling in my gut only intensified without him pressing into me. But a moment later, he gently tugged the blankets back before sliding his arms beneath me. I gagged and swallowed my vomit back down, the room spinning the moment I opened my eyes. “If you move me, I’m gonna hurl,” I warned.

“Throw up then,” he told me, not seeming like he cared as he gently—so fucking gently and slowly—lifted me from the mattress and against his chest. “Clothes can be washed. You probably need to throw up whatever is left in your stomach anyway. You’ll probably feel better.”

I blinked at him, trying to figure out what the hell was going through his head. He was acting like the old Salem. Like my Salem. And it was… confusing. I didn’t know what to make of it. Or of him. And my head hurt too damn bad to try to figure him out.

Salem was a confusing mess of puzzle pieces that didn’t seem to quite fit together. Used to be, my pieces fit seamlessly with his, making both of us whole. We were part of the same puzzle, each of us having the pieces the other didn’t have. But in the months we turned our backs on each other after that fateful night, our pieces became jagged. Broken. Ruined.

We didn’t fit anymore. And that… hurt.

“What are you doing?” I asked when he eased me onto the toilet seat in our bathroom.

He yanked his shirt over his head before dropping it to the floor. I forced myself to look away from his abs and toned muscles. From the light dusting of hair on his chest.

From my name tattooed above his fucking heart. Some days, I wished he would just black it out. It would make more sense. Still seeing my name on his skin, right above that important organ, just left me confused.

“We’re getting a shower.”

“Why?” I grunted as he turned on the water.

He turned to face me with an arched brow. “Because you smell like a fucking brewery, Tor. That’s why.”

I shook my head before groaning in pain. I closed my eyes and rested my head back against the shelf behind me. “I meant, why are we getting a shower?”

I didn’t bother looking when I heard Salem’s clothes hitting the ground. I was afraid to. I wasn’t sure if I could handle seeing him naked. Not now. Not after what happened a little over a year ago…and then what happened immediately after.

When he treated me like a stranger. When he’d treated me as if I meant nothing to him. As if he hadn’t been my sole reason for breathing for so long.

“Can you even stand on your own right now?” Salem demanded.

His body heat pressed into me, infiltrating every single one of my senses. Overwhelming me and making me fucking needy for him. When I peeked open an eye, he was standing right in front of me, practically hovering over me, his dark eyes roaming over my face.

“I could’ve taken a bath,” I griped.

He exhaled loudly through his nose. “You’re a right pain in the ass when you’re hungover and feel like shit, Tor. You always have been.”

I glowered at him, my hackles rising. “No one is forcing you to take care of me,” I snipped, immediately becoming defensive.

He suddenly grasped my jaw, his fingers pressing into my cheeks hard enough to bite. My nostrils flared, my cock waking up. Pain had always turned me on a little, but Salem… Salem touching me had the power to unravel me.

And he was shredding me to pieces.

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